RIO Claws Past SCREAM 4 at the Box Office!

Any doubt that there’s been a baby boom in the last decade? If you had one it will be destroyed by this weekend’s box office, when some kiddy original IP (with birds?!?) beats a beloved horror franchise. No, not merely beat … crushes!

Rio, the aforementioned original IP, is estimated to fly away with $40 million in its brightly colored CGI beak on its opening weekend. While Scream 4 only manages a rather anemic $19.5 million. Granted that isn’t a terrible showing for the fourth film in a series. Especially one that’s remained dormant for a decade. But it’s beneath even the low end of studio estimates. Poor Ghostface.

This could also be more evidence of audiences declining interest in the horror genre in the last year or so. Remember the weak performance of most of horror releases last fall? A trend only broken by Paranormal Activity 2.